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Dec 19, 2021

3 big problems with datasets in AI and machine learning

Posted by in category: robotics/AI

Datasets in AI and machine learning contain many flaws. Some might be fixable, according to experts — given enough time and resources.

Dec 19, 2021

These former Stanford students are building an app to change your accent

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, robotics/AI

https://youtube.com/watch?v=ZTZ1T9VBa-Y

Now their company, Sanas, is testing out artificial intelligence-powered software that aims to eliminate miscommunication by changing people’s accents in real time. A call center worker in the Philippines, for example, could speak normally into the microphone and end up sounding more like someone from Kansas to a customer on the other end.

Call centers, the startup’s founders say, are only the beginning. The company’s website touts its plans as “Speech, Reimagined.”

Continue reading “These former Stanford students are building an app to change your accent” »

Dec 19, 2021

It’s Hard to Deny It Was Elon Musk’s Year

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, space

He rules Twitter, the EV market and the commercial space race. Where can Time’s Person of the Year even go in 2022?

Dec 19, 2021

Baby driver: Philadelphia woman gives birth in front seat of Tesla on autopilot

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, robotics/AI

Yiran Sherry’s waters broke while the family was stuck in traffic. With contractions increasing rapidly and traffic barely moving, the couple realized they were not going to make it in time.

Keating Sherry placed the vehicle on autopilot after setting the navigation system to the hospital, 20 minutes away in the western suburb of Paoli.

He said he laid one hand gently on the car’s steering wheel as he attended to his wife.

Dec 19, 2021

The challenge and promise of quantum computing | Amazon Science

Posted by in categories: computing, quantum physics, science

During NeurIPS 2021, seven quantum computer scientists from Amazon came together to discuss the current state of quantum computing, some of the biggest challenges facing the field, and what the future might hold.

Panelists included:
• Simone Severini, director of quantum computing.
• Antia Lamas-Linares, principal research scientist.
• Earl Campbell, senior research scientist.
• John Preskill, Amazon Scholar.
• Katharine Hyatt, applied scientist.
• James Whitfield, Amazon Visiting Academic.
• Helmut Katzgraber, senior practice manager.

Continue reading “The challenge and promise of quantum computing | Amazon Science” »

Dec 19, 2021

Lightest Sound Insulation Ever Created Will Make Aircraft Engines 80% Quieter

Posted by in categories: government, transportation

In aviation, any advancement in design must either reduce weight or the benefit has to be worth the extra weight. Researchers at the University of Bath seem to have achieved the perfect balance between the two by developing a way to reduce aircraft engine noise by up to 80% while adding almost no extra weight.

As Green Car Congress reports, the research team at the University of Bath developed a graphene oxide-polyvinyl alcohol aerogel, which only weighs 2.1kg (4.6lbs) per cubic meter and therefore makes it the lightest sound insulation ever manufactured.


Researchers developed a graphene aerogel that reduces engine noise to the same level as a hair dryer.

Continue reading “Lightest Sound Insulation Ever Created Will Make Aircraft Engines 80% Quieter” »

Dec 19, 2021

Quantum effects make magnetene surprisingly slippery

Posted by in categories: chemistry, quantum physics

The ultra-slippery nature of a two-dimensional material called magnetene could be down to quantum effects rather than the mechanics of physical layers sliding across each other, say researchers at the University of Toronto in Canada and Rice University in the US. The result sheds light on the physics of friction at the microscopic scale and could aid the development of reduced-friction lubricants for tiny, implantable devices.

Two-dimensional materials are usually obtained by shaving atomically thin slices from a sample of the bulk material. In graphene, a 2D form of carbon that was the first material to be isolated using this method, the friction between adjacent layers is very low because they are bound together by weak van der Waals forces, and therefore slide past each other like playing cards fanning out in a deck. For magnetene, the bulk material is magnetite, a form of iron oxide with the chemical formula Fe3O4that exists as a 3D lattice in the natural ore. The bonds between layers are much stronger in magnetene than in graphene, however, so its similarly low-friction nature was a bit of a mystery.

Dec 19, 2021

50 Years Ago, Scientists Were Genetically Modifying Mosquitoes

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, genetics

In 1971, scientists turned to genetics to control disease-spreading mosquitoes without DDT. Today, there are a variety of pesticide-free methods.

Dec 19, 2021

Amazon to launch an Instacart-like service in the US next year, report says

Posted by in category: futurism

Amazon’s online grocery delivery efforts are reportedly set to ramp up in the US and Europe in 2022.

Dec 19, 2021

Cosmologists Close in on Logical Laws for the Big Bang

Posted by in categories: cosmology, mathematics, physics

Physicists are translating commonsense principles into strict mathematical constraints for how our universe must have behaved at the beginning of time.